Tools / Compare
Compare two versions
A second version arrived and you were told it is the same document. Put both files in below and this page will tell you whether they are the same file, and if not, where they differ and what to read first.
Private by design, and you can check
Both files are read entirely inside this page, in your browser. Nothing is uploaded, sent, or stored, and nothing is written to your browser's local storage. You do not have to trust that sentence. Open your browser's developer tools, look at the Network tab, and run the comparison: no request carrying your files leaves the machine. Work on the originals, not copies you have re-saved, because re-saving rewrites a PDF's internal metadata.
What this tool can and cannot prove
It can prove the two files differ, and show how. A SHA-256 hash is a fingerprint of the exact bytes of a file. Different hashes mean different files, full stop. A text comparison shows which passages were added or removed, and the watchlist below points you at added language that changes legal obligations.
It cannot prove intent, authorship, or that a change was "material."Materiality is a legal conclusion. This tool reports differences and signals, never a verdict, and it will never use the words fraud or illegal. If the differences are large and the stakes are high, take both files and this output to a lawyer.
Metadata is a claim, not a fact. The producer, creator and date fields inside a PDF are plain text that any common tool can edit in seconds. Treat a surprising field as a question to ask in writing, not as evidence of anything by itself. The same caution applies in reverse: identical metadata proves nothing, because it is just as easy to copy.
Incremental updates are normal in signed PDFs. This page counts the save generations inside each file (the %%EOF markers). A signed document will almost always show more than one, because signing a PDF appends a new save session. That count is context for the other signals, never a finding on its own.
A DocuSign limit worth knowing. An envelope ID and a certificate of completion authenticate a signing envelope. DocuSign itself states that it has no record of changes made to a PDF before it was uploaded to an envelope. So a different envelope ID on the second version is a meaningful flag to ask about, and the same envelope ID is not proof that nothing changed before sending.
One habit that helps later. The day a first version arrives, run it through this page on its own, or any hash tool, and email the SHA-256 hash, not the document, to your personal address. That timestamped hash proves those exact bytes existed on that day, whatever is said afterwards.
To check by hand, or on a computer you do not control, thestep by step guide covers the same checks using software already on your machine. If the comparison shows changes you were not told about, theredline request letter is the next step.